Bootleg Question

[TheGreenStrat]

Unsure if this is the best place for this question but what’s the best way to get started in mixing and or editing bootlegs from sources? Is there a way to access those items? I really appreciate all the work many others have done and I’m passingly curious on looking into this myself.

[Skinny12]

Hi,

First you need a Software you feel comfortable with. This might be reaper, audacity or whatever. Then you want to know what to attack, the sound or clicks, bumps etc.

Depending on your goals you start with working on the file…

Creating a matrix is much more complicated…

Best
Nils

[MrFender]

Audacity is free and there are plenty of resources on the web to learn how to use it. It's relatively easy to pick up (just look at me!), the hard part is learning the ins-and-outs of tweaking the sound through multitude of effects and settings such as EQing, amplifying, noise reduction, etc. There's lots of YT videos on it, you just need to grab some shows and experiment. Make it sound like garbage? Just hit CTRL-Z.

Creating a matrix does take work, just getting the various sources to line up is a challenge. Even the same model of digital recorder can be just a little off on their clocks and that's all it takes to get all out of whack just a song or two into a show. Lot of respect for those that can work with analog (tape) sources. And then there's balancing the volume/noise/etc between the two. I'm not a master at it by any means, the majority of ones I've done are from running 4 inputs into the same deck. Once I just got plain lucky that everything lined up with another person's source. Mics and volume worked perfectly with mine. When it works, the sound of an ok show suddenly can turn into a really good one with the added depth.

Give it a try. With the free tools that are available, all it really costs is your time.

[TheGreenStrat]

Thanks for the replies! I’ll see if I can find time soon to start grabbing files and messing around.